School Profiles

HOERSKOOL CRADOCK HIGH SCHOOL

Tue, 03 Aug 2004 00:00

School's profile

We profile Cradock High School.

Sir John Francis Cradock, an Irishman, became governor of the Cape in 1811 and was much involved in the unhappy wars of the Border area. He was not long at the Cape, returning to England in 1812 where he was later created a baron.

The town, about 260 km from Port Elizabeth, was founded in 1813 on the banks of the Great Fish River to look after migratory farmers. One of the ten oldest towns in South Africa, it is a centre for the farming of sheep, goats and cattle. It is a beautiful town amongst the mountains.

Nearby is the Cradock Mountain Zebra part which played an important part in saving the animals from extinction. There is a sulphur spa and was the home of Olive Schreiner whose grave is on the top of Buffelskop.

Perhaps the most famous happening at the town was the funeral of the Goniwe Four in 1985 which gave rise to the uprising which ended apartheid.

School

Cradock is an old town by South African standards and so is the school. Its roots go back before the Great Trek into the early 1830s but it then was forced to close because of financial problems.

In 1838 the Cradock Free School opened and in 1870 a boys' school, founded by L Eaton with 20 pupils. In 1900 it moved to a new building in Bree Street with 145 pupils. In 1932 the boys' school moved into the Teachers' Training College.

In 1869 Rocklands opened as a girls' school though it takes 1875 as its foundation date.

In 1972 Cradock Boys' High and Rocklands amalgamated to form the present Cradock High School. The boys' school became the Cradock Primary School, and Rocklands became the High School.

Cradock Rovers is one of South Africa's oldest clubs, sadly a casualty of the shrinkage of rugby in country areas, especially after the reduction in the number of provinces from 22 to 14 in 1996. One of those that vanished was North Eastern Cape, founded in 1903.

The rugby opportunities for schools were further curtailed in 2001 when the number of teams at Craven Week was chopped from 32 to 20 and then in 2004 to 18.

In 2003 there was one player from the old North Eastern Cape in the Eastern Province Craven Week side, in 2004 three - two from Marlow and one from Union High.

But Springboks came from Cradock. Old boys of the school who played for South Africa are Mannetjies Michau and Baby Michau in 1921, Jorrie Jordaan and Fiks van der Merwe in 1949, Salty du Rand from 1949 to 1956 who captained the Springboks and Giepie Wentzel whose great nephew Deon Stegmann was chosen for SA Schools in 2004 from Grey College.

One of its Old Boys, William Schreiner, was prime minister of the Cape and president of the South African Rugby Board.

Rivals

The biggest match of the year in Cradock is the one between Cradock High School and Marlow, the agricultural school just outside Cradock. It is played on the town field, a neutral venue, which is then full to overflowing as it seldom was when North Eastern Cape played.